Michael Sean Winters: Elizabeth Warren urges Dems to pass needed legislation to avoid being clobbered in the midterms; report on A.J. Oliver, who was pushed out as a Democratic committee chair due to his pro-life views.
Michael Sean Winters rounds up political news and commentary: The role of religion in the politics of Russia and Ukraine; pivoting away from culture war issues; Latino vote in Nevada; protecting children in Texas.
Michael Sean Winters: The vaccine phobia that has taken hold of the GOP base is also affecting religious folk. But pastors need to focus not on misplaced moral scruples but on the moral urgency of getting people vaccinated.
Distinctly Catholic: Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who signed the anti-abortion bill into law in May, has spent most of his tenure and all of the summer showing that fetal heartbeats are the only heartbeats he cares about.
Distinctly Catholic: The individualistic approach to COVID-19 vaccines has plagued the center's analysis: the idea that a conscience need only wrestle with its own concerns, and not also consider what is owed to others.
Michael Sean Winters rounds up political news and commentary: The GOP scrubs its website of praise for Trump's peace deal with the Taliban; Mark Silk on Ben and Jerry's boycott; Thomas Levergood loved the church's intellectual tradition.
We say: Texas Gov. Greg Abbott champions religious liberty — that is, until he wants to appear tough on immigration with an executive order that imperils migrant shelters, including those run by Catholic Charities.
With a surge in the first few months of 2021 of minors entering the United States without a parent or guardian, figures from fiscal year 2020 already have surpassed the total of unaccompanied minors who made border entries during the previous year.
